Abstract: The trend in wireless communication receivers is to capture more and more bandwidth to support higher throughput, and to directly sample the radio frequency (RF) signal to enable re-configurability and lower cost. Other applications like instrumentation also demand the ability to digitize wide bandwidth RF signals. These applications benefit from input circuitry which can perform well with high speed, wide bandwidth RF signals. An input buffer and bootstrapped switch are designed to service such applications, and can be implemented in 28 nm complementary metal-oxide (CMOS) technology.

Abstract: Apparatuses and methods related to digital mobile radio (DMR) with enhanced transceiver are disclosed herein. The transceiver detects waveforms of signals received by a digital mobile station radio (MS). By detecting whether the waveforms of the signals, the transceiver allows a digital baseband processor of the MS to remain in a sleep state while the signals are being detected by the DMR, thereby reducing an amount of power used while the signals are being detected.

Abstract: Comparator input noise or offset suppression can include an error detector circuit that can operate in a feedback loop, such as during an autozero phase. The error detector circuit can include a time-varying filter response to improve accuracy and convergence time. The comparator can be used in a successive approximation routine (SAR) or other analog-to-digital converter (ADC) circuit, such as to control a digital-to-analog converter (DAC), such as can be used to adjust a tuning circuit within the comparator to compensate for noise or offset. The DAC can be combined with a DAC used for carrying out SAR bit-trials or bit decisions.

Abstract: A sample rate converter (“SRC”) for implementing a rate conversion L/M is described wherein data is input to the SRC at an input rate (“Fin”) and output from the SRC at an output rate (“Fout”) equal to Fin*L/M. The SRC includes a low pass filter (“LPF”) including P multiply-add instances, wherein P is a parallelization factor of the SRC; an input formatter for arranging samples received at the SRC in accordance with the rate conversion L/M and providing P*Tpp input samples to the filter at a given time, wherein Tpp is a number of taps per phase of the LPF; and a coefficient bank for storing a plurality of coefficients and for providing P*Tpp of the coefficients to the LPF at a given time.

Abstract: Apparatus and methods for reducing charge injection mismatch are provided herein. In certain implementations, an electronic circuit includes one or more switch banks. Each switch bank can include a selection circuit and a plurality of switches that can be controlled using one or more clock signals. The selection circuit can select a first portion of the switches for operation in a first switch group and a second portion of the switches for operation in a second switch group. During a calibration, the electronic circuit's charge injection mismatch can be directly or indirectly observed for different switch configurations of the switch banks. The electronic circuit can be programmed to operate with the selected switch configurations of the switch banks to provide the electronic circuit with small charge injection mismatch.

Abstract: An antenna apparatus for calibrating one or more of a plurality of antenna elements of an antenna array using one or more probes is disclosed. The apparatus includes an upconverter and/or downconverter (UDC) circuit and a calibration arrangement that includes a switching circuit. The switching circuit is configured to enable operation of the UDC in a first mode or in a second mode. When the UDC is in the first mode, the one or more probes are electrically disconnected from the UDC circuit and the UDC may be connected to at least one of the antenna elements. When the UDC is in the second mode, at least one of the one or more probes is connected to the UDC circuit.

Abstract: An optical device package is disclosed. The optical device package includes a substrate that passes light at an optical wavelength. The optical device package also includes an optical device assembly that is mounted to the substrate. The optical device assembly comprises an optical device die. The optical device die has a first surface that is mounted to and facing the substrate and a second surface that is opposite the first surface. The optical device package further includes a molding compound that is disposed at least partially over the second surface of the integrated device die.

Abstract: In electronic systems, the downstream circuitry may be damaged by overcurrent and overvoltage events. Therefore, there is provided a dual protection device for protecting electrical components in electronic systems. The protection device includes a mechanical fuse in conjunction with an electronic fuse, eFuse, the two components connected in series, together protecting against overcurrent events on two levels. The mechanical fuse provides high overcurrent protection, realising fast and reliable protection at high overcurrent events, and the electronic fuse provides low overcurrent protection, realising accurate and resettable protection for low overcurrent events.

Abstract: Noise sources in an ADC circuit can include kT/C noise of a sampling capacitor, noise coupling on to sampling capacitors from digital circuits, and amplifier noise. Also, charge injection from mismatch in sample switches can cause offsets. These various noise sources can be largely canceled or reduced using described techniques. As a result, the size of the sampling capacitors can be greatly reduced, while still achieving significantly improved noise performance and power efficiency for the overall converter.

Abstract: Embodiments of the present disclosure provide mechanisms for measuring currents flowing in one or more conductor wires. The mechanisms are based on using magnetic sensor pairs arranged within a housing with an opening for the wires, where each magnetic sensor pair can generate a pair of signals indicative of magnetic fields in two different directions. The outputs of the sensor pairs can be used to derive a measure of current(s) flowing through the one or more wires. The use of magnetic sensor pairs that can measure magnetic field in two different directions may enable simultaneous current measurement in multiple wires placed within the opening, improve accuracy of current measurements while relaxing requirements for precise control of the placement of the wire(s), reduce the impact of stray magnetic interference, and enable both AC and DC measurements.

Abstract: An electronic circuit can include a gain adjustment circuit (e.g., a gain “equalizer” circuit), such as to compensate for a variation in insertion loss over a specified range of frequencies. For example, such a gain adjustment circuit can provide an insertion loss characteristic having a specified slope. Such a slope can include a positive slope where insertion loss increases with respect to frequency, or a negative slope where insertion loss decreases with respect to frequency, as illustrative examples. A gain equalization technique can be used to compensate for variation in insertion loss versus frequency between different circuit paths, such as in relation to a switchable delay line having two or more selectable paths, such as for phase shifting applications. A gain adjustment circuit can be configured to provide relatively flat or constant time-domain delay versus frequency, such as inhibiting or reducing dispersion.

Abstract: Random chopping is an effective technique for data converters. Random chopping can calibrate offset errors, calibrate offset mismatch in interleaved ADCs, and dither even order harmonics. However, the non-idealities of the (analog) chopper circuit can limit its effectiveness. If left uncorrected, these non-idealities cause severe degradation in the noise floor that defeats the purpose of chopping, and the non-idealities may be substantially worse than the non-idealities that chopping is meant to fix. To address the non-idealities of the random chopper, calibration techniques can be applied, using correlators and calibrations that may already be present for the data converter. Therefore, the cost and digital overhead are negligible. Calibrating the chopper circuit can make the chopping more effective, while relaxing the design constraints imposed on the analog circuitry.

Abstract: A line driver circuit is configured to provide a high spurious free dynamic range output and includes first and second output transistors and a control circuit. The first output transistor is controllable to pull an output node to a logic high state, and the second output transistor is controllable to pull the output node to a logic low state. The first control circuit is connected to a control input of the first output transistor and configured to establish a control signal at the control input of the first output transistor while the second output transistor is in a low impedance operating state to reduce an imbalance in turn-on delay between the first output transistor and the second output transistor.

Abstract: Disclosed herein are systems and techniques for auxiliary master and/or auxiliary call support functionality. For example, in some embodiments, a communication system with auxiliary master functionality may include a master node coupled to a plurality of downstream slave nodes, wherein at least one of the slave nodes may perform master node functions when the master node is disconnected from the system.

Abstract: Various examples are directed to a measurement system for measuring an electrical property of skin comprising an excitation circuit, a receiver circuit, and a sequencer circuit. The excitation circuit may generate a periodic excitation signal that, when provided to the skin, generates a response signal in the skin indicative of the electrical property. The sequencer circuit may be configured to activate the excitation circuit to provide the excitation signal to the skin. While the excitation circuit is activated to provide the excitation signal to the skin, the sequencer circuit may activate the receiver circuit to execute a first sample cycle to generate a first plurality of samples of the response signal. A first value for the electrical property of the skin may be determined based at least in part on the first plurality of samples of the response signal.

Abstract: To extend dynamic range, a depth imager can expose a scene with two different exposures to obtain two depths. The two different exposures are selected to have respective depth ranges that overlap each other. The two depths can be combined by taking into account the difference in exposures and where the two depths are located with respect to boundaries of an overlapping range of the two depth ranges. The combination of the two depths in this manner can help avoid image artifacts such as contouring.

Abstract: An electronic circuit comprises multiple analog-to-digital converter (ADC) circuits and control logic circuitry. The control logic circuitry advances the multiple ADC circuits through multiple time-interleaved conversions that include time-interleaved acquisition phases, conversion phases, and tracking phases. An acquisition phase of a first ADC circuit samples the analog signal, a conversion phase of the first ADC circuit converts the sampled analog signal to a digital value, and the control logic circuitry is configured to update the first ADC circuit with most recent A/D conversion information by a different ADC circuit during a tracking phase of the first ADC circuit before the acquisition phase of the first ADC circuit.

Abstract: Devices exchange control signals with each other to ensure proper operation of an overall system. For instance, in a communication system, a baseband processor and a transceiver communicate with each other to exchange information for controlling the respective signal processing parts of the baseband processor and the transceiver. While Serial Peripheral Interfaces (SPIs) can be used, SPI can be extremely slow, and does not provide a protocol for allowing a complex set of control signals to be exchanged between the baseband processor and transceiver. The present disclosure describes a fast control interface which can support various modes of operation in allowing two devices to communicate with each other quickly and effectively.

Abstract: The disclosed technology generally relates to forming metallization structures for integrated circuit devices by plating, and more particularly to plating metallization structures that are thicker than masking layers used to define the metallization structures. In one aspect, a method of metallizing an integrated circuit device includes plating a first metal on a substrate in a first opening formed through a first masking layer, where the first opening defines a first region of the substrate, and plating a second metal on the substrate in a second opening formed through a second masking layer, where the second opening defines a second region of the substrate. The second opening is wider than the first opening and the second region encompasses the first region of the substrate.

Abstract: This disclosure describes, among other things, embodiments of devices, systems, and methods for using 3-dimensional (3D) magnetic sensors to detect the position of a magnetic target. By using 3D magnetic sensors, a two dimensional array of such magnetic sensors can be used to determine a 3D position of a magnetic target.